Let Them Eat Cake
by Grav
Summary: In which Jonas tries to understand the finer points of culture, Teal’c offers advice, and cake is consumed.


AN: Sara Grissom requested fluff, so fluff there will be.  This takes place between the time when SG-1 saves the world in Redemption, but before Jack and Jonas talk at the elevator.

Summary: In which Jonas tries to understand the finer points of culture, Teal'c offers advice, and cake is consumed.

"I think I am going to go and eat cake." Jack O'Neill, Redemption I

Spoilers: Redemption, minor for Urgo

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~Let Them Eat Cake~

Dessert after one has saved the planet is especially good, even if you get it from the commissary on a military base.  Not that the commissary food was bad, but desserts almost had to be homemade to be completely effectual.  Or so Jonas Quinn had been informed.  Earth humans enjoyed their desserts, and Jonas got a kick out of watching them eat it.

Jack O'Neill always ate dessert with gusto.  It seemed he remembered the "Urgo Incident", and was trying to find out if he could ever make desserts taste that good again.  They never did, but he always tried.

Jonas noted, from his unobtrusive position across the room, that O'Neill's plate still had some broccoli on it, but that the Colonel had nonchalantly placed his serviette over top of them.  Jonas made a note in his book to ask Major Carter if this was customary.

_Speak of the Devil_, Jonas wrote in his planner as Samantha Carter walked into the commissary.  The Major picked up a piece of cake at the counter, and then sat down at the same table as O'Neill, with her back to Jonas.

With both of their faces now blocked, Jonas relied entirely on watching Major Carter's shoulders to discern the rate at which she consumed her dessert.  Opening his book once again, Jonas made a note to ask someone if it still counted as a dessert when consumed in place of a meal.  Returning his attention to the matter at hand, Jonas observed that Major Carter ate dessert the way she did everything else: methodically.  Judging from past observances, Jonas hypothesized that Major Carter not only ate her dessert methodically, but did so while exuding that very private sense that she got the whole joke, and everybody else had slightly mistranslated the punchline.

The movement of Sam's shoulders indicated that while she ate, she was laughing at something Colonel O'Neill was saying.  She did that a lot.  Of course, O'Neill was purportedly very funny, and since neither of them had laughed much lately, it was good to hear them again.  Jonas was genetically human, but Jack's sense of humour often left him confused.

Across the room, Carter swallowed her mouthful of cake, and whispered conspiratorially across the table to the Colonel.

"We're being examined."

"What?" said O'Neill, choking on his fork.

"Sh!" she hushed him.  "I think he's taking notes."

Jack looked surreptitiously over Sam's shoulder.  Sure enough, there sat Jonas Quinn, absently eating a bowl of soup, and writing things down in his notebook.

"Well, I'll be damned.  What in hell is he doing?"

"He keeps asking me the oddest questions.  About our customs.  And I don't mean like Christmas.  Yesterday, he asked me why the position of the toilet seat was such an issue."

"Why?"

"He wants you to trust him, sir." Sam pointed out. "He wants SG-1."

"And how will toilet seats help?"

Carter shrugged.

Jonas, who was busily comparing the nutrient content of 100 grams of broccoli against 100 grams of cake, suddenly found his view of the Colonel's table obstructed by the hulking form of Teal'c.

"Jonas Quinn, what are you doing?" Jonas had never been a part of a military organization, but he always found himself snapping to attention when Teal'c addressed him.

"I am researching." Jonas replied. "I am trying to understand dessert."

"That is an interesting concept." Teal'c said. "But I am afraid you will not get answers you understand.  This culture is not something easily examined or explained."

"You fit in.  Sort of."

"I have had five years of practice, and I have viewed a great many movies."

"Ah," said Jonas, not understanding that last part. "Then what would you suggest I do?"

"I would suggest," said Teal'c, his resonant voice seeming to echo through the room, "that you let them eat cake."

Across the commissary, Major Carter's shoulders began to shake and Colonel O'Neill choked on his fork.

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AN: Wow, did this ever not end up where I planned it to.  I blame my anthro classes, and am particularly fond of the bits about the broccoli.

What did we think?


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